ICS girls beat Lucerne for second time in two days

The Crusaders stepped up their defensive pressure to win their fourth game out of their last five chances.The Immanuel Christian girls basketball team held Lucerne Valley to two points in the first quarter, stopped the Mustangs’ outside shooters and gave up only 12 points through three quarters to cruise to a 43-21 win Tuesday in the Kerr McGee Center.

RIDGECREST — The Crusaders stepped up their defensive pressure to win their fourth game out of their last five chances.

The Immanuel Christian girls basketball team held Lucerne Valley to two points in the first quarter, stopped the Mustangs’ outside shooters and gave up only 12 points through three quarters to cruise to a 43-21 win Tuesday in the Kerr McGee Center.

“I was really proud of our defense,” ICS Coach Bob Smith said. “Our girls really stepped up and were scrappy tonight. I thought that our defense was 100 percent better than it was the night before. Last night against the same team, we gave up 38 points. We need to keep teams to under 35 or we’ll have to work a lot harder to get wins.”

Smith said although the defense played well through the first two quarters of Tuesday’s game, the offense sputtered. ICS led only 8-2 after one quarter of play and 20-7 at halftime.

“Coming into this game, I really thought we could score 60-to-66 points,” Smith said. “I told the girls that I wanted to try something different. We just played Lucerne last night, so I made some adjustments. We started with the press and we put our speed people in the game. I wanted to press them enough to get them tired. It worked because their coach didn’t make any adjustments to it, but our eight-point first quarter should have been a 20-point first quarter.

“I vented my aggravation at halftime. We should have been well on our way to clearing our bench in the third quarter.”

Although the Crusaders didn’t score as much as they wanted, ICS had a 5-0 run to start the game and a 12-0 run to start the second quarter.

Smith said Vitale had her second straight strong performance against Lucerne Valley. In the Crusaders’ 58-38 win on Monday, Vitale had eight points. She followed that performance up with a six-point, eight-rebound game Tuesday.

“She played a really good game tonight, but played excellent the night before too,” Smith said of Vitale. “She is not afraid to get in there and rebound with anybody.”

The Crusaders (5-3) started playing better offensively in the third quarter with Mondragon and Hazlewood leading the way. Eight of Mondragon’s 10 points in the game came in the third quarter, while Hazlewood added another seven of her own on her way to a 17-point game.

Hazlewood had 11 total points in the second half and is starting to get a good feel for her new position as the small forward on the team. She now gets more catch-and-shoot opportunities. It’s Hazlewood’s second big game. She scored 23 points Monday against the Mustangs (0-5).

Page 2 of 2 - “She gets a lot of opportunities because the ball bounces her way,” Smith said. “She is a very opportunistic basketball player. To me, that is what we need. We need shooters to loosen the middle of the zone defense because every team in the Hi-Lo will run a 2-3 zone that is packed tight in the middle.”

Lieser had five points on the night, but Smith said he likes to see her shoot. Hazlewood and Lieser shooting the basketball from the outside allows other players a chance to get involved as well by hitting the offensive glass.

“Even when we miss, it seems like we’re getting the offensive rebound 80 or 90 percent of the time,” Smith said. “We have Morgan and Elicia who can hit those outside shots, which makes the defense spread, so we have more space in the middle of the floor to score and grab those rebounds. We’ve done a great job this season of maximizing our shot opportunities because we are a very good offensive-rebounding team.”

The Crusaders had 56 shot opportunities on the night by creating turnovers and grabbing offensive rebounds. Smith said his team also does one other critical part of the game well right now that he hasn’t seen in past years.

“They’re making good passes, sharing the basketball and looking like a team,” Smith said. “We’re no longer playing one- or two-person basketball, which is great to see.”

Hazlewood finished the game with 17 points, five steals and three assists. Mondragon had 10 points, four steals and 17 rebounds, seven of which were offensive. Vitale had six points and eight rebounds. Henderson had five points and 11 rebounds, while Lieser had five points and two blocks.

The Crusaders move on to play Mammoth at 5 p.m. Friday in the Kerr McGee Center.